Hayao Miyazaki, of Studio Ghibli fame, has launched into one of his trademark rambling tirades against the ills of technology, likening “iWhatever” users to “chronic onanists.”

The remarks came in the context of an interview with Miyazaki published in “Neppu,” an in-house Ghibli rag, which had been covering the iPad.

Upon being confronted by an interviewer fiddling with his iPad, Miyazaki let loose:

“That thing that looks like a gaming device in your hand, along with that strange stroking movement you make with your hands is by no means attractive to me, nor am I at all impressed by it. I feel a sense of revulsion for it, in fact.

I’m sure in short time there will be an increase in people on trains making those strange masturbatory strokes. It was the same when everyone started reading manga on trains, and when it became cellphones – I’m fed up with it.”

That was merely his initial statement.

The interviewer went on the defensive, describing how he thought the iPad a good tool for research, and something to buy books on and look up information with.

This only aggravated Miyazaki further however:

“It may seem like I am ignoring your human rights to say this, but you can’t research any of that. Why? Because you have no way of knowing what it’s like to be on an old trireme, or having empathy with the men on board, covered in sweat as they labour at their oars.

You go out into the world without enriching your imagination. You are merely grasping the iWhatever as a skimming tool you use to stroke yourself.

I’m sure there are many people who want to become omnipotent by getting their hands on this iWhatever. I’ll tell you sir, there were once a bunch of people who wore radio cassette players (those bulky things) wherever they went in the sixties. They wore it like a priceless emblem.

They’re mostly probably living off of pension funds now, but you and them are the same. You jump at the newest gadgets, and all you do is relish the pride in owning one as some consumer.

You must not become a consumer. You must become someone that creates.”

296 Comments

There’s logic in what Miyazaki says: “you should go out more to experience the world and absorb what you learn to create, instead of being a consumer latching onto another person’s invention and do all the exploring from a monitor.”

While I am impressed by his statement, not everybody wants to be like him ; I do love to indulge… but I do my routine traveling for inspirations for my drawings as well

even if you don’t like it…
even with the gay subcontext…
even if you hate his stuff…

he is right! people have fallen to the system, humanity has fallen into a pit hole
nothing is worth anything anymore, why bother with anything ?
i mean i would prefer if instead of having all this cool devices, we had a cure for Cancer, Aids, if we hadn’t started spoiling the sea in our greed for that devil’s shit called oil, but instead we can settle for being ugly fat and masturbate to our lovely 2d lolis while the world burns outside.

Miyazaki has spoken! iPads are unnecessary and are just another product of Apple’s masturbation. WE MUST CREATE! Like why surf the web and masturbate, when you can sit down with a pen and paper and maybe write the next Howl’s.

He’s right, though. Why do people find the iPad so amazing? It’s no different than other similar touchscreen computers or whatever. The whole thing about books is also a pathetic excuse, as well (books have infinite battery lifespans). The whole idea of it is lame.

But I have to admit, his whole masturbation and “stroking” bit made me ROFLMAO.

We need consumers, but how else does consumerism flourish if there aren’t others who try to increase comptetion with much better and more convenient products others will buy? Making too much of the same product will get no business anywhere far.

I think he means masturbating as something like “closing yourself in”, in the sense of not caring for others while being stuck in some iWhatever parallel dimension of pleasure that doesn’t let you create, IMO most of us who visit this page are like that, but who really cares…

you ppl are morons…miyazaki is not saying that every piece of technology is bad, or that buying things is bad…he saying that all these ipad fanatics are morons who jump at the newest item everychange they get like a dog chasing the nearest car!

hes saying stop being a follower and attempt to lead the pack for once! even if its not “POPULAR”…

is this old fuck actually saying everyone who listens to music is pathetic?

is anyone to take him serioualy?

i get the hate for iwhatevers, especially the ipad, for very basis reasons.

i dont like gestures, i like tactical feel when im using something. i dont like not pressing a button to press a button.

when ever ipad figures out a way to make the screen expand so you can feel the button is when this tech is truly ready, but until than i would much prefer something with real physical buttons, for watching video for listening to music, and sure as fuck for using the internet or typing.

Old Hayo is seeing his country, the world economies and himself decomposing right before him. Of course like any rotting old thing, they have a tendency to rant about all them youngins’ and their remote electro talkie things! It’s a right for getting more dead then anyone else and I believe its to be appreciated~ for the humor!

Word can’t describe how happy i am after reading this.
After becoming Ghibli fans , now he comes to this statement which has 100% similarity for what i am thinking all this time.
Of course, many retarded ass sucking apple fans only knows to lick and buy everything Steve Jobs spew at.
You just a tool, add with consumerism mindless moron mental attitude.
And i’m really speechless to some people here who pointing the problem as Miyazaki wants us to watch his anime instead buying apple products.
Thats not the point dumbass.
He wants us to THINK, not to consume anything cause its new trend and dandy.
While Miyazaki provides us with anime to enriching our imagination, and how it relates to the current world, steve jobs provides us with product to make us less like lazy social parasite arrogant human being.
Wake up moron.

“Because you have no way of knowing what it’s like to be on an old trireme, or having empathy with the men on board, covered in sweat as they labour at their oars.”

And I bet you have. You’re actually 2600 years old and Greek. You spent your life as an oarsman on an Athenian ship before you became immortal then you moved to Japan and… oh my god, the Sean Connery character from Highlander was bassed off Miyazaki! And Steve Jobs is another Immortal. THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!

The iPad was nothing new. In fact, Apple hasn’t come up with anything actually new since 1993 – when they introduced the Newton, the original portable touch-screen computer. And Steve Jobs was subhuman; the real brains at Apple was Steve Wozniak, who left because Jobs was a tool.

[quote]”It may seem like I am ignoring your human rights to say this, but you can’t research any of that. Why? Because you have no way of knowing what it’s like to be on an old trireme, or having empathy with the men on board, covered in sweat as they labour at their oars.”[/quote]

It totally seems like he is ignoring human rights, indeed…
So, easy access to information is bad?

While I agree with most of the interpretations of Miyazaki’s words regarding mindless consumerism, I think he is still putting too much blame on mere [i]tools[/i].
The iWhatever may be tightly closed, censored and restricted; but I bet you can at least use it to watch one of his movies. Now, is that such a bad use?

I thought what he said was fucking awesome and I agree with him in a way.

This isn’t just an old man in him speaking. Miyazaki was always known for his remarkably rebellious and anti-establishment views. This is very rare amongst Japanese, who are taught to conform from an early age. When he was young, I heard he even played a hand in radical communist circles, but that’s beside the point. He says it like it is. Today we live in a culture of consumer totalitarianism. We always need to buy the newest and the latest stuff in order to conform to peer pressure and impress our friends.

Seriously what good is an Iphone? It’s just another piece of useless electronic garbage that will get replaced by some “next” generation gizmo in a few years, and people will fork out another 300-400 dollars to buy it. This has nothing to do with actual progress of technology. He rails against society’s shallowness, it’s obsession with material wealth and expensive electronic baubles.

His message is controversial which lot of people don’t like. But I can understand perfectly where he, as a creator, is coming from. He spent his entire life giving us these movies he labored so hard on. Much to his chagrin, they’re always treated as consumer products. I bet at the end of the day, he feels no different than a starter of a chain of house cleaning products. Is he really happy about the fact that his works essentially launched a wave of superflat mania in the country? I don’t think he intended his artistic creations to serve as a basis for a hypersexualized subculture. Of course it all makes him shocked and bitter. To him, every new bit of technology is just a tool for satisfying the public’s base desires.

Hey guy, I believe the words Miyazaki used isnt as simply as it means there are hidden messages within …although it may sound crude but that’s still pretty cool, still my guess is that maybe he just wants to express his concern about more and more people now are being “enslaved” to apple

everybody missunderstood his point, wich is that technology that is supposed to bring thw world closer is actually separating individuals from each other, and that buying and “iwhatever” is not actually buying the product but the social status it represents

He’s sorta right, for the wrong reasons. People are stupid regardless of whether they own an iPad or not. Technology itself signifies the progress of the human race. The thing is that technology makes it easier to have instant gratification. Enjoying ourselves is not new; using an iPad is just as mastabatory as reading a book or playing sport.

So I guess the point is to stop enjoying ourselves so much and work so that others can enjoy themselves.

Reading on public transit: perfectly fine, be it books or manga
Using laptops (and iPads, portable consoles etc) on public transit: fine unless they are disturbing others, with sound for instance
Listening to music with headphones: also fine unless it’s really loud
Using a cell phone: Annoying but won’t go away
If you’re not overtly loud and disturb others it’s no big deal, just like normal conversations face to face

Actually, Japan is pretty anal about people doing anything in a train or subway car besides looking bored, staring straight ahead, or sleeping. They even put up signs telling people to not read newspapers and discouraging women from applying makeup while taking public transit. Hell, this social disapproval has shamed people to such an extent that they “brown bag” their manga and novels – covering them in a brown, neutral dust jacket – so that no one can figure out what they’re reading.

Miyazaki is saying people who mindlessly consume lead ignorant, unproductive lives that ultimate amount to nothing and that observing this phenomenon infuriates him.

When told that technology like the iPad enriches people’s lives, Miyazaki rebukes that by saying the guy has no concept of hard work nor the skills it fosters; he goes onto express that novel innovations in technology will never substitute it.

His closing line harks back to a day when practically every person had productive skills: cooking, carpentry, machinery, etc.

You can’t learn a language from a computer program, at some point you’ll have to go communicate with another human being for any meaningful gain.

first of all what the hell is a trireme. Second of all this guy’s a dickwad. Third of all if a person shouldn’t consume then he shouldn’t eat food since eating something is consuming. This guy’s a douche.

Sounds kinda ironic.
Steve Jobs created Apple and helped Pixar all the way here.
Without Steve Jobs’ vision, Apple and Pixar would be nowhere near where they are now.

Compared to that, Miyazaki is only getting old and nosy.
I know Miyazaki is a fantastic guy and brought us great pieces of work like Naussica and Totoro.
But comparing him and his studio with the Pixar guys or Apple only makes him look bad….

All was chaos and disorganized, no communication, no computation. Then came almighty Jobs, and the iFuture was on us.

First he gave us the Graphic User Interface, the iMouse, the iMac. Then he gave us the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad. He knows what we need to hear and watch and gives those things to us via the iStores (for moneyz).

Most of you fail to understand this. Maybe the whole translation was wrong in this, or some parts of it from the origional Japanese.

But as a artist and illustrator myself, I fully understand what he means.

Back in the old times, when people had to research something, they went to libaries and many other places to find the information. To find resource and ideas to make a scene in manga too, they actually went to the place to find reference and experience the real image they want to portray.

Just that now, people have the internet and stuff like the iPad whatever. The interviewer mentioned saying ‘good for research’.

But what Miyazaki saying is, that is only an excuse. People nowdays say stuff like, ‘my internet was down, so I couldn’t research stuff’.
That is one bloody retarded excuse, you have books and libraries with thousands of books.

He is basicly saying, people are too reliant on technology and they base their mind on them too much.
He lived in a time where everything was done manually, now we have programs like Photoshop which can do convinient tricks that you can’t do with on a piece of paper, you even have tablets to ‘replace’ pencils.

In a another word, we are becoming too lazy. We sit in a chair all day looking at our computer screens to do everything for us. Not limited to just using photoshop, but research/shopping/chatting/facebook, they even have online schools now!

What Miyazaki means is to be more active.

Technology advances every year. The iPad is the same, soon it may even replace school books.

But when technology fails us, like a blackout or a internet cut. We start going crazy and we blame technology.
But in reality, no one realizes that we HAVE other options.
Like how many of you have spare candles and a working lighter in your homes?
How many of you go to the library?

Like there was someone who was asked to draw something and he eventually came back and said ‘my tablet is broken, so I can’t’.
I mean what about drawing on paper?

Just think about it that way.

Like I used to have a iPhone, I used it everyday as if it was like a computer. I spent 100$ every month on it and I even barely made any calls on it.
Now I don’t own any cellphones, people call me an idiot saying I can’t contact anyone without it.
But again, in reality I still have my home phone and emailing at home.

You kids these days with your iMasturbators! Back in my day, we walked halfway around the world to get to school in -50 degree weather through the jungle during simultaneous typhoons, firestorms, and the Apocalypse, all while naked, just to get to school every day!

You make a number of great animations, and suddenly you think your opinion is special. Michael Jackson was an awesome musician, and he still died a little boy fucking sicko pervert.

And I have the edge on most of you guys here. I am not quite as old as Miyazaki, but, I predate all the cool fucking toys.
I predate any form of hand held electronic.
I was here before cable TV and colour TVs being common.
I predate fucking FM fucking radio.

Yeah I remember when a Walkman was a status object. I recall people carrying ghetto blasters.

I recall the first portable phones that were as convenient as military radios.

I remember when kids played outside, and the only thing to do on the way to work was read a newspaper. Hell I remember when paperback books were considered the doom of hardcover editions and proper book sellers scorned their existence on their shelves.

But you either used tech or get used BY tech.
I think he is just bitter that thanks to tech no one really needs him any more.

Seen how easy it is to be self published lately?
Ever notice how easy it is to use Adobe and churn out fairly passable music videos?

Maybe he's just not reeeeeally enjoying not being fucking special any more.

Yeah Miyazaki, I too could bitch if I wanted to. You know, a laser can make a chair better than me, in mere minutes.
Yes people, I can run a program that with a lazer, can zap chair parts out of solid wood from holographic images and have a robotic machine assemble the parts such that I don't even need slave chinese labout to make them.
Or I could just be the guy running the fucking lazer and robotic equipment.

Someone needs to tell Miyazaki to fuck off to his face.
To drop the elitist crap.

I think everyone here partially missed the point. Consumerism and technology isn’t the problem. It’s immersing yourself in it to the exclusion of everything else. The man was suppose to interview him and was instead fiddling with an I-pad. That’s about as insulting as taking a call or texting while on a date. When you’re using a walkman or today’s I-pod you are in your own little world. The same with reading manga on a train. I think it was mostly on the lack of human interaction and being impolite. The Japanese are big on being polite, especially the older ones.

Exactly! How anyone can misconstrue his rant as being against technological progression is beyond me. The man says it himself; it doesn’t matter whether it’s the new iWhatever, cell phone, cassette player or manga, the result is the same. You can’t get much more technologically simple than ink on paper can you?

He doesn’t hate technology, he hates the lifestyle that it encourages. What happens when you read manga or play with your iPad on a train? You’re completely immersed in it and in your own little world. You’re completely oblivious to the world around you.

I think his consumer/creator line is a little lost in translation. He is not saying to not buy anything ever or to constantly create things. He is merely saying that you should have an original thought once in a while. Rather than regurgitating the same crap you “consume” everyday from your “research” on your iWhatever, how about you experience things for yourself and “create” your own thoughts.

“He doesn’t hate technology, he hates the lifestyle that it encourages. What happens when you read manga or play with your iPad on a train? You’re completely immersed in it and in your own little world. You’re completely oblivious to the world around you.”

Either I completely misunderstand you or this is absolute nonsense.. What is wrong with reading or listening to music on a train? Belles-lettres books are meant to take you into their little world, great fiction books are loved for the atmosphere their authors create! It is one of the main beauties of books that they take you on a wonderful journey, to the new worlds, unknown places, etc. And mostly the same goes for music!

What do you expect from people on a train or an airplane? Bothering unacquainted passengers around with senseless conversaitions?

@bloo
His example with a train was indeed far from being the best one.

My point is that he is generalizing too much and that if a person is using an iWhatever device it doesn’t necessarily mean he is influenced by it but regards it as a mere tool which helps him do business more efficient. It doesn’t necessarily mean he is fed rubbish from the net (besides for this you don’t need an iWhatever gadget – a common TV is more harmful in brainwashing and manipulation), and so on.

I would also argue the point that people are taken over by their iWhatever devices: the gadgets are only proxies and people are taken over by easy access to an enormous pool of data – Internet/TV&Cable/etc. And from that pool they choose easy digestible, meaningless rubbish which they take for granted/retwitt/repost and so on. No analysis, no brain – no pain. So you see the point why I’m irritated: a bunch of plankton use a wonderful tool for stupid things – and the man starts accusing the tool, that’s dimwitted.

This is a really narrow-minded point of view generalizing all people who possess “iWhatever” devices do not know a better way to put them to use but for Twitter/Facebook/Farmville and so on.

Also, calling classical books ‘iWhatever equipment’ is really weird.

About your example with a bus: just imagine a bus, or a train, and all passangers staring at each other “paying attention” at how they interact or nodd off, that’s creepy. 🙂 I just hope your love for staring at other people is not a beginning of something bigger, something like stalking..

I see where you’re coming from and it’s my fault for not being clear enough.

What I’m saying, and where I feel Miyazaki is coming from, is that immersing yourself too much in these things can be dangerous, especially if you no longer notice the world around you.

Think of society in the book Fahrenheit 451 (if you’ve read it). I think Bradbury and Miyazaki have very similar philosophies. People in the book become so immersed in pointless distractions, that all human interaction becomes meaningless because everyone is merely repeating the same crap they are fed. No one ever has original thought because they no longer want it, and are perfectly content with being fed thoughts and ideas.

This doesn’t mean that all media or technology is evil or meaningless. It means that it can become dangerous if you allow it to completely shut you off from the outside world all the time. I think Miyazaki chose a bad example in the train, but I believe that what he meant was that those things (iPad, etc) have too much influence on people’s lives, especially if it prevents them from experiencing things for themselves.

Why don’t you try to not use those equipment in the bus for one day. Did you notice that you are actually paying attention to more things? Like how old man A is interacting with old man B? Like how that bus driver is nodding off?

He is telling you to stop relying on your technology, stop consuming like a ravenous locust and start trying to experience things for yourself and generate your own thoughts instead of what is being fed to you via your iWhatever.

For a second I thought I was being trolled. The title had miyazaki’s name in it, but the pic looked like the KFC mascot guy. Although the fact that I’ve never seen a recent pic of Miyazaki is probably a key contributor to my ignorance.
Oh well! I don’t have or long for an ianything, but I’m more than happy with my onnanistic tendencies. Happy faping to all and to all a good fap!

It’s easy for someone like Miyazaki saying people should be more creative. By try living the life of an average Joe who has to get by life day in day in a dead end job. I don’t think there is room for creativity.

Oh, but we all have a potential for creativity? Notice how you dislike the way your cubicle is arranged? Did you start putting stuff to liven up your desk? Did you add a couple of photos to the cubicle walls? Did you shift the furniture a bit for a change of view?

Congratulations, you have just displayed creativity! Now see what you can do next.

I do believe you missed alot of the points made in your fit of anger. While it is peoples choice in what they do, hes trying to point out that its bad to buy products in succession just because its the current fad, thats what we call mindless consumerism. If you have something old that works and gets the job done just as good as what you can go out and buy, why waste the money on buying it?

You are wrong about the ‘anger’: as I’ve said, everyone goes crazy in his own way and it’s pointless to become angry about it.

As for the ‘mindless consumerism’: on one hand, there is a sanity limit to everything, and if a person buys .. let’s say a new cell phone one day, gets bored with it and buys another new model in a week or a month – yes, it’s silly, but on the other hand the person earned his/her money and has a right to spend them as he/she likes. And neither you, nor me, nor anyone else should restrain his/her freedom of choice to do so. If you don’t like it – raise your children the way you believe is ‘right’.

Do notice that this was not in a comment to the main article but already in a trailing post to the ongoing discussion. “Restraining” view was clearly in Kei-chan1’s message “if you have an old model which is working – don’t buy a new one of the same class because it’s a waste of money”.

And nobody was trying to silence the initial orator, I don not know why you suddenly came up with protecting his freedom of speech – there is not a single word that he must shut up and stay quite, there are only remarks that his view should not be considered as indisputable truth.

Well the old man is right in a way.
I don’t totally disagree.
I am guilty of this though!
Going out and getting the newest gaming system for super graphics and stuff, but I’ll still play classics like FF8 and Crash Bandicoot.
I don’t have a super tiny cell phone that can do everything, or a dumb ipad that is just a flat computer.
That’s just a waste of money if you ask me.

Miyazaki always seems to have hypocritical views, and ironically he understands that. He doesn’t like people, especially children, wasting their time on cheap things such as manga or video games, yet he makes manga and anime.

There’s also the paradox of if everyone is a creator, and no one consumes, no one can survive in an economy. Maybe that’s his point. He wants people to create not for money, but for passion.

Even if I don’t understand or agree with him, I respect the fire in his belly, and love his work.

He…He doesn’t make manga or anime. Studio Ghibli has only ever made feature films, and Miyazaki is known for rejecting many industry production standards (like hiring underpaid seiyuu from seiyuu production companies). Just because the films are anime films doesn’t make them categorically similar to anime.

Many other people have talked about what he meant, I’m not going to beat a dead horse.

Great point. Honestly, I’m a bit tired of creators coming out and preaching like that, but I guess it comes with the territory of being a celebrity. I know he wants to be seen as a steady, non-mainstream, down to earth figure, but he’s jumped that shark decades ago. He’s not fooling anyone.

I never care about nor support the iPad but seriously wouldn’t like if some random senior citizen (regardless I know how important it is to respect them) to suddenly approach and for no reason start preaching me about his tough ol’ days or worse; criticizing the techy stuffs i am using that time. The last time I was in church, I popped out my cellphone from my pocket to check what time was it (since I usually don’t wear watches). Then some old lady started to lectured me about how wrong it is to text messaging during a mass. I then tried to tell her that I was just checking the clock but she kept on her lecture blabbering about kids nowadays can’t live w/o their gadgets blah blah and so on..

Well, eventually I just put on a straight face and let her finish her talk. Nothing happened in the end, fortunately.

Well, on the flip side, he’s likely right about all the iWhatever users being wankers. Not that there is anything particularly wrong with that. I bet he’s lamenting about how in his days, he had to use his imagination to wank off or draw his own dirty pictures. With porn so readily available, I guess it stifles one’s creativity.

Ahh, Miyazaki *.* he’s so awesome.
Yeah, he does sound like a cranky geezer I admit, but he does have a good point. People obsess too much over iphones and shit, they limit our perspective in a way.
And frankly, I’m also rather skeptic with all these kinds of things, in fact I avoided getting a cellphone till just last year >.> the only useful feature I find is texting and calling, all those apps are shit.

I wouldn’t write off ‘all those aps’ in a blunt way. Sure, the addicts are annoying no doubt. But the reason why the aps do so well is because they’re so useful in so many different things.

I can understand Miyazaki’s point to a certain point, but writing it off entirely as ‘masturbatory’ is just a silly, childish insult. I honestly don’t see why he had to take such a confrontational stance on this. Reminds me of Ebert and his games can’t be art stance.

Sadly in general I agree, even if the real thing he’s trying to convey was conveyed in anger. It’s proven that we lose all real sense of imagination if we bury ourselves in technology too much, but really it depends on the person. Granted though, most people are just pathetic with technology and use it too much anyway, me included, so sometimes it does help to be reminded to simply daydream a bit with everything off once in a while with a good book.

He’s just another old man afraid of technological innovation. He envisions a simpler world, where everything is less confusing, more cut and dry. The iWhatever signifies more of something he cannot understand, and because of that he is disgusted by it. It’s an unnatural thing to him.

I guess some of us have to be those irritated old bastards. This seems to be a growing trend with people whose products I greatly appreciate.

Yes, I am sure I have seen his movies. They are among my favorite animated films. The view that he preaches within are far more digestible than these interviews in which he speaks out unnecessarily angrily against this or that object of the day.

He’s not just speaking out against consumerism, he’s speaking out against the progressive technological progression that humanity has tasked itself with. I find it insulting for him to so simply handwave away another facet of beauty that he refuses to entertain.

Esau, you fail to understand that progressive technological advancements do not mean the human race is spiritually advancing.

Economics-wise, yes humanity is progressing. But Spiritually??? … And my point is creativity of course.

Mr. Miyazaki wants everybody to know that what makes a man a man is not his devices but what he labors as love. The same goes for the ladies. So it’s not fapping of course nor IWhatever. We are who we are by the things we love to do.

Apple is making creative products, but human experiences are much superior to wacky gadgets, you can make ’em NOT BUY THEM.

That’s exactly what he’s saying: They are objects of the day. The will soon be replaced. In a year, Apple will release a new iPad, and then everyone will buy that and get rid of their old one. None of these things are timeless. The same cannot be said for his movies though. You can’t replace Princess Mononoke, Nausicaa Valley of the Wind, or Spirited Away. You can’t even update them. They are timeless, and he is a timeless creator. He is only urging others to do the same.

While there is something to what he’s saying, he does come off as an unnecessarily bitter old man. It’s not practical for everyone to do what he’s doing, and having more knowledge available to us is a good thing. I personally don’t like the iPad or any Apple products, though.

Aye, you can’t trust the interviewers too much, you never know what he said or how he said it. For all we know this article is seriously twisted from the words of his mouth.

It wouldn’t be far-feteched to say that hes not wrong, most the consumors now are fairly mindless. I also dislike apple products, but w/e, if people want to waste money on the overly expensive products like the Ipad thats their business.

ok here I am, I’m disagree by most of his statement, I’m not a fan of iWhatever I tell you that (I fucking hate iPh*ne), but rejecting new innovation and even sarcastic about it in front of others are simply not nice, ok everyone need to be creator, need to be creative, and what so wrong being creative with new gadgets ? better equipped and ready to welcome new challenge that comes with it ?
his quotes about cannot research blablabla are depends on the person that use the device, the fault are never on device !, holding an iPad doesn’t make you secluded, you will still need to go down on the field and look the thing you need to know with your own eyes, he’s simply too sarcastic. as if he never read a book as his reference, ‘research tool’ means one tool in research, and not the whole research in one tool, can’t he even see that ?

if we keep rejecting things like this old man, I’m sure we still use chalk to write a notes (nor can we write on this page)

He’s got a point on cunsumership though. But he’s not entirely right. The correct logic would be like this: “You buy a device, a useful and practical device, and you use it for your benefit. That’s ok. But you turn into a fucking consumer the moment you buy another same device just because it got a few more pixel in their screen”

Want to watch video? Listen to mp3? Read ebook? Surf the web?
All high-end phone can do that!
And I can always buy an Asus netbook if I wanted more functionality.
There is nothing wrong with old man Miyazaki.
Those people who are fiddling with their iPad don’t realize their stupidity, that they have been ripped off. All apple products are too expensive compared to the price of the components they used.

Bingo! But to mindless consumers it doesn’t matter… Slap a brand name on it, make it do less than the conventional option, charge a good deal more than the conventional option, make it “pretty” and call it “innovative” and people will mindlessly flock to it.

I was just about to write that, what a fucking retard. So what if i want to be owner of new gadgets. If i want to watch manga porn in train then i am going to fucking do it.My life, my choice. If he dosnt like porn he shouldnt look at other peoples ipads. No one cares about this retarded moron, he cant stop me nor you.

It would be a beautiful world if everyone created something, it’s not that there won’t be buying power, one person cannot fulfill all his needs because he can only specialize in a limited field. So you buy from me a painting, I buy from you a gadget.

You are looking on the wrong side, iWhatever are just a new shape of mobile computers, it’s not a technological breakthrough, have you read that US almost completely shutdown the space program and now rely in Russia to put people in the space ? not forget the sabotage of alternative energy projects, Instead they prefer to spend human brains into new generation of iFads

There is no evidence that the guy he got pissed at bought his iPad for the sake of buying an iPad. The owner certainly denied it and the iPad is actually a useful device that brings functionality other devices don’t have (yet), unlike the iPod, the iMac, and so on (I’m not belittling those devices either, I’m just stating the truth).
And then there is the problem of the name calling, and the fact that he doesn’t listen to the people he’s talking to.
He isn’t misunderstood. He’s an arrogant ass who apparently refuses to think and talk at the same time. Yes, we all like his films, but I suspect we would like them a lot less if he weren’t able to reign in this part of his personality when writing the script.

Before the XXth century there were more creators than consumers, people designed their own furniture, sewed their own clothes for the same damn reason to show off their personality (or even their future hopes) by the objects they were using. Well a sewing machine is a great improvement but compared to the old ages our dresses shows less and less uniquity, designers are reusing old styles to make something ‘new’. And yes people that time were lazy enough to buy a pair of boots in the shop so they didn’t made everyting on their own. I’m just saying compared to the old we fail at using our current technology to make everyone unique items, clothes, etc. Welcome to the new age of barbarism. 😉

He is right about one thing: all those modern devices, netbooks, smartphones, iWhatever will in a no distant future be obsolete useless pieces of metal, a fad with the rights a joke, many people jump to buy those new gadget with no other desire than fulfill their consumption needs.

You know, there are a lot of people who have creative hobbies because that’s what they like to do. Think of all the people on deviantart and pixiv. Hell, even those goddamn fanfic writers are creators.

He means that you needn’t be mindless consumers, not that everyone should be “creators” at all times. He’s simply asking that people exercise their brains once in a while in order to be discriminating consumers and seems to be angry at the fact that people eat this sort of hype up like a dog eats its food.

Can’t say I blame him. The brain seems to be an extraneous organ in about 90% of the human population. If it weren’t for people like good old Hayao here, we’d probably all be wallowing in some sort of consumerist hellhole, buying whatever is presented to us without question.

No, he’s just chewing out someone using a computer with a touch screen – who apparently had legit reasons to use one – with a string of straw men and ad hominems.
It doesn’t really matter if his anti-consumerism conclusion is right or not – I’ve gotten As for exams using what essentially amounted to this trick: http://xkcd.com/759/.
No, the central thing that all this is about is his way of thinking. And that is something along the lines of: sees something new he doesn’t understand (A), gets angry, ladles random idealistic conclusion from memory (B), shoehorns A to B with a hearty dose of get-off-my-lawn, and makes a fool of himself.

Gotta agree. I’m not a big fan of Miyazaki and he’s clearly into his oldaged-conservative-days but this time he’s totally right.
Apple and its ishit stuff will sell no matter how crappy they are because of mindless costumers.
We are in the consumeristic era after all.

This is only based on rumors though. I have yet to try to control a Mac or Linux myself, even though I’ve seen the program run on a computer before. I’m interested in experimenting, but there is no doubt if the rumors I’ve heard are true, that I’m going to use a PC/Linux. (Aspiring to become a game designer/Game programmer. So yeah :P)

mindless corporations buy PC because of compatibility issues. to train a whole new set of tech staff so service a different type of system & replacing all the systems is also very costly. also note that PCs work better than Macs when ur making servers.

There’s also the original Mac which created the point and click interface used today. So I’m wondering, if the Mac, iPod, and iPhone are the only useful things, then which of their products exactly are the bullshit ones?

Well, it’s the sign of the times, I’d say. However, the iShit is not the only line of merchandise that sells like hotcakes despite being bloated in price and less useful than other less expensive devices.

Hmmm…i suspect he can no longer masturbate himself. No wonder he sounds bitter.
If he wants to talk how to save both humanity and nature he should talk against overpopulation.
But i love his works, whatever stupidities he may sprout during his free time.

But then again, aren’t we all technically creating? Like…the internet, it’s our creation of ideas/games/knowledge/porn/whatever.
Of course there -are- some mindless people out there, but still. He does have a point, but his way to describe it is just….><….I have to agree with Shippo about the "masturbatory motions". That was…a bit too much.

Yeah, being a consumer and being a creator are not a dichotomy. All he’s saying is that you shouldn’t be a passive consumer and let others push their stuff on you like you’re a blank slate… you should be creating and putting your own stuff out there. But it’s not like you should stop consuming to do that… taking what others have done and building on that is a way to create.

And that answer just proved his point to you. You just look whats in the outside without looking into the meaning of things, like the phrase you mistook for just one angry statement instead of looking outside the box.

Seriously? He stumbled over one sentence! He makes a valid point about how people are obssesed with fleeting bullshit (such as 98% of all apple products)and all you can do is cry about one sentence. Its pathetic if you really think that he means to stop comsuming alltogether, maybe if you read into the context you can see that hes talking about spending $1500 on a computer that you jerk off.

I appreciate his core point, but it came off as just wrong. For one, there is nothing wrong with consuming. But it’d be nice if people are more on the creative side, but I don’t like how Miyazaki is making this a divisive issue when it simply isn’t.

Secondly, jeez, ‘masturbatory motions’? That is pretty damn sick… Also, I don’t mind people relying on old-world technology, but then Miyazaki goes on an Andy Rooney style diatribe about modern society and how everything we do are bad, annoying, etc etc.

Honestly, I admire Miyazaki as an animation genius, but that article made my respect for him as an intellectual man plunge quite a bit. Sounds to me like everyday jaded and disgruntled old person.

He isn’t editing wikipedia, he just used an effect phrase to say we must not be slaves of consumerism. Creating doesn’t necessarily mean you gotta sell what you create either.

Learning how to make yourself a chair instead of wasting half day to go buy a crappy ikea one, or make yourself a new table lamp out of old stuff you don’t need anymore is already creating.

What the old man really is trying to say is that instead of rushing behind whatever useless order or gimmick we are given, we should stop and try to learn to dominate our surroundings, instead of being dominated by them.

i think that is just how people are. they like new things so they rust to get it first even tho they know its going to have problems. apple stores have lines that are 6 blocks long. but imagine the satisfaction of saying “i got the iPad on the first day it was out!”

(i was just using that as an example i don’t think iPads are so cool personally)

i also agree with this man. it’s aggravating seeing everyone rush to the nearest electronic store to just get the newest POS that just will have as much bugs as the cheap rip offs that’ll come out in months. It’s senseless. :\

he’s entitled to his opinion, even if it’s stupid. then again he is getting up there in age, and it seems the older you get the more you complain about new fangled technology. if it were up to people like him we’d be in the dark ages. i still love his anime, and respect him as an artist, though.